Date: Sun, 09 Aug 2015 22:22:29 -0400
From: mark <whitroth at 5-cent.us>
To: WSFA Official List <wsfa-forum at yahoogroups.com>,
 WSFA members <WSFAlist at keithlynch.net>,
 bsfsgeneral <bsfsgeneral at bsfs.org>,
 "gt-pfrc at ml.gt.org" <gt-pfrc at ml.gt.org>
Subject: [WSFA] A letter to fandom
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at KeithLynch.net>

Well, two big things coming up for me: leaving for Worldcon in just over a
week, and Philcon, this year, the week before T-day... where I'm throwing a
party, with Filthy Pierre as my co-host, and the theme will be a century of
fandom...and that's because, at a party a few years ago, we discovered we'd
both found fandom the same con, the same day: Philcon '65,

So, yeah, I've spent most of my life in fandom... and just about all the best
things in my life have come either through fandom, or spinoffs of fandom. Now,
I'm not saying that we don't have our share of idiots... but I think they're a
smaller percentage than *out* *there* (motions towards the street).

Now, a number of you have heard my minor rant on how I dislike the word
"geek", and that the real origin of it is carny slang, and referred to the
usually retarded guy who made his living in the freak show, billed as The Wild
Man of Borneo, or some such.*

I've tried to come up with something better - techie, or something. Then, what
got me writing this email was that I'd just started a book in the 1632
universe, 1636: Commander Cantrell in the West Indies, and saw this:
"Who would have ever guessed that his marginal nerdiness would one day make
him a star? Back up-time, in the twentieth century, his identity as gamer,
military-history nut, and educated layman on all the related technologies had
me him one of the boys that the hot-looking high school girls had looked
straight through - unless they needed hel with their homework.
<..>>
[T]he down-timers didn't see the geekiness of it all. To them, he was simply a
young Renaissance Man, a creature all at once unique, and brave, and furnished
with powerful reservoirs of knowledge that were surprisingly deep and
unthinkably wide."

And that's what I think of most of fandom: Renaissance people, recognized or
not, except by each other, our peers.

Who are are family, too. Thanks, folks, I can't imagine life without you all.

mark

* Newt Gingrich, who had his first wife served with divorce papers while she
was in the hospital for chemo, qualifies as a geek.